


Symmetry

by Alsike



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, F/F, Heat Hookups, Legal Drama, Mating Cycles/In Heat, Pack Parent(s), Polyamory
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-15
Updated: 2017-05-16
Packaged: 2018-11-01 02:45:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 17,576
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10912719
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alsike/pseuds/Alsike
Summary: Justice Alura In-Ze, head alpha of the great house of Ze, is much more interested in getting her work done than in omegas. But when she picks Lucy to be her intern, suddenly omegas become very important: how do you talk to them? What counts as polite?Even if omegas are just people, they're still omegas, and boundaries make all the difference. Too bad Alura didn't figure that out until it was too late.But Lucy is exceptional, and when Alura needs help sorting out the chaotic mess that Kara and Alex have got themselves into, she knows she has one last place to turn.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Ooops. And again, I have committed ABO with more worldbuilding than smut. Thanks to all the people I spitballed this with--you know who you are, and thanks for all of your ideas which I probably wantonly stole and then messed up in unsatisfying ways.

Alura didn't usually notice the students running around the library. Not all of them recognized her, and yet she was still a professional, in her judge's robes, not student black, so they knew to stay out of her way. But not all of them.

"Excuse me, do you think I can have that when you're done?"

The girl, a bit older than Kara, in student black, with her soft hair pulled back into a low tail, was frowning seriously at the book she was citing in her opinion.

"I'm sorry. Do you need Rand's Conversions urgently?"

"There's an extra credit assignment, writing an opinion about a current case, and I was hoping to use a Rand opinion in my discussion of why Ma-Zul's petition to be reclassified as a beta should be honored."

"You think it should be honored?" Alura blinked at the rather brassy student. "And you are using Rand as precedent?" Her intent had been to use Rand to write the opposite. And her judgment was not an extra credit assignment. "Explain."

With accompanying hand gestures the girl narrated a very unexpected reading of the Rand case, and applied it to Ma-Zul's absurd petition about changing his status from Alpha to Beta after an accident cost him his knot.

"It's a nuisance suit," Alura said. "I don't have any idea how it got to this level of court."

"It _isn't_ ," the girl protested. "I admit, Ma-Zul's case is a nuisance, but it is an important precedent. Technological advancements could result in hormonal therapies that alter Kryptonian genera within decades. What if a beta becomes an omega, undergoing heats and being receptive to an alpha's mating bite? If they cannot change their assigned status they will not have the protections given to an omega. An omega who changes into a beta will not be allowed the freedoms of a beta, still not allowed all the rights of a beta-citizen, even when their body no longer constrains them."

Alura considered her words for a long moment. Then she made a note. "What year are you?"

"Um, third," the girl said.

Alura made another note. "And your name."

"Lucy?"

Alura waited.

"Lucy Sam-Lane." Her eyes skittered away.

The name was familiar. Sam-Lane had been a no-house moving up in their military guild, until a short-sighted and bigoted decision led to the deaths of twelve civilians and his dishonorable discharge. "I see."

"I apologize for disturbing you Justice . . ."

"In-Ze."

Lucy froze, her eyes peeked upwards to stare in horror at Alura. "In-Ze?"

"Tell me," Alura said, leaning forward on her elbows. "Are you looking for an internship?"

"I-- um," Lucy gulped. "I just assumed I wouldn't--"

No one probably would have volunteered to take the girl from the disgraced military guild no-house family. "I'll request you, if you're interested. But I'm afraid I need the Rand book for a bit longer."

#

Young Alex was hanging around again. Her husband was off planet, brokering a deal with the Daxamites, and Kara was in the laboratory with Zor, leaving the girl at loose ends. In any other situation it would be inappropriate for a young married unbred omega to be spending time with an unmated alpha like Kara, but the Danvers had been adopted by the house of In-Ze, and so they were technically family. Technically. On occasion Alura wished that Jeremiah hadn't died protecting her wife. If the Danvers were simply a no-house family, Kara could have taken Alex as her _chatis_ \--rut-servant--and Eliza would not have been able to broker the marriage with the Lord clan.

The Lords were eager for any link to the In-Ze name, and marrying their son to the honor-daughter of the In-Ze clan got them into far more business deals than they would have otherwise. But Kara's white face and tensed hands as Alex exchanged bracelets with Max-Lord was not something Alura wanted to remember.

Eliza said that Alex would be fine once she whelped--too busy to be sad. But the girl deserved better. Astra would have taken her as a trainee if she hadn't been an omega. Zor-Ze said she had an aptitude for lab work, and would have sponsored her through the advanced science guild training, but the Lords were uninterested in what an omega could do besides conferring house status and bearing pups. It would have been hard enough for Alex to pursue a guild membership if she was Kara's _chatis_ , but Alura would still have been her superior alpha and made certain that she had a choice.

Alura had never had a _chatis_ , but Astra had two, and when Astra was near, and Zor was unavailable, she would occasionally join them for rut. Both were . . . Astra's sort of omega, outspoken and abrasive. But because of that Alura knew they were well suited to her lifestyle. They benefited from Astra's position and did not sacrifice their own goals or pursuits. And neither of them blinked an eye at the fact that the twins could share omegas in their ruts. Only a few other alphas could do that, and the alphas usually were pairbonded to each other--whatever 'pairbonded' meant when neither partner was receptive to a mating bite. Leslie made jokes about Astra and Alura 'pairbonding' when they were young. Astra had purred into her ear, 'don't tell her yes or no, not knowing and thinking about it makes her hot,' so she stayed silent on the subject.

Honestly, she didn't know. Play-biting when they were kids could have formed some sort of hormonal bond, but there was no way to tell. Littermates didn't usually have that kind of connection, but identical littermates were rare, so the data was insufficient.

Alura usually assumed it was because Astra just wasn't a very possessive alpha. When Alex had gone into heat and holed up in her room with suppressants and a vibrator, Astra had been making jokes about taking care of her, and Kara had gone for her throat. Astra--always the soldier--had put her down and then tugged her niece's hair. "If you don't want someone else to give her her first knot, maybe you should pop in and look after her." Kara had looked mortified, and Astra had squished her face and added. "If you need practice first I can loan you one of my _chatis_. They'd be happy to get a knot from a delectable little alpha like you." Kara had been so bewildered by this that she'd come to Alura, asking if she'd be expected to share her omega with anyone--once she had one. Alura had soothed her confusion, but hadn't been able to explain Astra any better than she'd explained herself.

Alura wondered if she had the same lack of possessiveness, but it was hard to tell. Zor, the omega of the first El litter, had been appealing during his heats and they had pairbonded temporarily while he whelped. But Zor, quite a bit older than her, had entered into his rearing phase of life, and hadn't gone into heat for a few years now. Alura could feel her own cycle, and when Astra and her harem were off-planet, she had a few bad ruts. But mostly she could ignore it, unlike Kara, still young and obviously sensitive to Alex's heat cycle, who wrecked her room and rutted against her mattress, and yet would not let Alura hire an escort for her.

When Max-Lord got back from off-world and finally mated his wife during her heat, Kara might change her mind. Alura would be ready.

Alura contemplated the student she'd met in the library. She hadn't been able to pick out her genera, possibly a beta, but there had been something pleasant and lingering about her scent that suggested omega. Would Kara like her? Alura wondered. It would be a relief if Kara had a heat-partner who she was able to be a friend to. It would make separating from Alex as Alex became absorbed in her life as a wife and mother a little easier. And then, when they found Kara an appropriate match, she could rebuild her relationship with her childhood friend as adults.

#

"Um, I'm here."

Alura looked up and spotted Lucy hovering in the door. Nerves made her scent much stronger and Alura breathed it in. Ah, definitely an omega. That meant the door would have to stay open. Other alphas might be distracted by having such a pretty omega around, but Alura had never had the sort of thoughts other alphas claimed--more evidence that the treatment of omegas as helpless pup-generators was socially constructed.

"Come in." Alura gestured her toward a chair. "I should have warned you before asking you to be my intern. I've had two assistants quit on me because they could not manage the work-load. So getting bound to me for school credit alone is rather unfair. If you ever feel that it is too much to handle, please tell me, and I can get you a transfer."

Lucy's mouth tensed and she leaned forward, lacing her fingers together. "I'm sure I can manage."

Alura smiled. She was stubborn. "I hope you can. What's your cycle like?"

Lucy flinched, her face going red and her knuckles going white. Alura paused. She hadn't worked with a lot of omegas, and the ones she had were usually older. Was this an impolite question for the younger generation?

"What do you want me for?"

Alura still couldn't figure out what was going on until it clicked. This sort of thing had happened frequently when omegas were still new to the guilds--older alphas taking young omegas as 'interns'. But could Lucy really think that she . . . Alura realized she'd been referring to the girl as Lucy in her head, without any title or honorific, like one did with an omega under your influence. She breathed out. Some habits were hard to break. "I apologize if that was inappropriate. I simply was hoping to be able to schedule the trial dates of my more important cases around it, so I would not be unexpectedly abandoned."

Lucy bit her lower lip, looking away, and then looked back, meeting her eyes with determination. "It's fine," she said stiffly. "I'm not particularly regular, but it's very rarely longer than two days. Usually six or seven weeks apart, last time was about two weeks ago. Even if I have to go home, I can still work for most of it."

Alura did her best to show no reaction. This _was_ an inappropriate question. She should have had a form or something, to make it more impersonal. Because now, somehow, she wanted to ask if Lucy had a bondmate or a regular heat-partner, or if she stuck it out alone, working through it as best she could. That's what it sounded like. And if it was so, well, it was something they had in common, though heats were reportedly at least twice as distracting as ruts.

_Lucy, at her desk, pen clenched tightly in straining fingers, sweat on her brow, hair falling over her shoulder, baring her unmarked neck, one hand creeping down to press between her legs, a restrained gasp, she bites her lower lip, starts tugging at her overrobe--_

Alura choked, turning quickly away and ruffling through the files she'd spent nearly an hour organizing earlier. She could handle this. It would be good for her. She didn't have much experience working with an omega, and experience was the only way to gain perspective. "Right. Well, here are copies of the cases I'm currently preparing. I will need you to be conversant with the first ten by the end of this week, and the first thirty by the next."

Lucy brightened at the horrendous amount of work and nodded, reaching out. Her pleasure at being given what highly decorated alphas had fainted under reassured Alura that she had made a sensible choice.

#

"I've never known you to think with your knot," Astra said, sounding amused. "But picking up a cute omega student as an intern in the library is pretty edgy for you."

"She was clever. That's why I wanted her. I didn't realize she was an omega until she came into my office. She's still clever. It's just tricky. I never know if I'm saying the wrong thing."

"Well, clearly you haven't said the _right_ thing."

"Which is?"

"Come home with me for your heat and you get full marks."

" _Astra_. She's a child. She's barely older than _Alex_."

"Alex is married, if you forgot."

Alura's mouth tightened. "Too young."

"You were younger."

"Yes, which was highly awkward for everyone involved. But it's different for omegas--"

"Because they're weak and need protection?"

Alura sighed.

"Leslie and Mags would both smack you."

"This what I mean about saying the wrong thing."

Astra huffed out a breath. "Here's the rules. Omegas are people. But they're also omegas. So they like respect, but they are used to not getting it. Treat her like an intern, and if you fuck up and treat her like an omega, listen when she tells you not to and apologize."

"I can do that."

"Good." Alura could hear Astra smile. "Just remember, she is a cute omega. If she does need a heat partner and asks you, it might be good for you."

"You just need to come home."

Astra snorted. "It's true. Mags has been whining about not getting double-knotted for _months_."

Alura winced. Remembering Astra's pretty tiny _chatis_ squirming between them wouldn't help. Lucy was similarly tiny.

"You know," Astra said before they ended the call. "This is a relief. I was a little worried that you were going into rearing-state early along with Zor. Kara might be growing up too fast, but some alphas sire their first litter at your age."

"I'm not the one who put that off, dear sister." Alura sighed. "Right now, Kara's more trouble than she ever was. She could probably use some of your advice. And as we have discussed, I'm still fumbling about with the nuts and bolts of being an alpha."

#

After a few weeks, Alura was sure she had overthought things. Lucy smelled lovely and made her office a far more pleasant place to be, but she was very determined and a hard worker and Alura was too busy to be bothered by the omega pheromones. Lucy was clever and thought in a very different way than Alura did. Perhaps that had to do with being an omega also. But, overall, Lucy was simply an excellent intern.

"You should come home with me for dinner tonight," Alura said.

Lucy froze, her eyes going wide. "I-- um."

Alura hadn't been thinking, well, not about whether or not it was an appropriate request. Just that Lucy had been complaining about the dormitory food earlier and Max-Lord was back from Daxam tonight and Kara had been climbing the walls. There was going to be a celebratory dinner over the deal Max-Lord had brokered, with the Lords and Eliza, and honestly, Alura just wanted a buffer so that everyone would be on their best behavior. But even her phrasing of the request had been unfortunate. She hadn't _asked_. Omegas were used to being treated without respect, Astra had said. If Lucy were an alpha, how would she have made the offer?

"Would you consider joining us? I can only promise you a good dinner. Everyone will be there, and it might be chaos. But I enjoy your company, and I'm sure my husband and daughter would like you also."

Lucy bit her lip and then nodded, smiling awkwardly. "I'd like that."

Alura found herself smiling back.

#

Dinner, as predicted, was indeed chaos. Alex was vibrating with tension and drinking herself sick. Kara flew off the handle at Alura when she tried to get someone to pass the _a_ _ikap_ to Lucy, clearly making her sire the target of her anger to avoid attacking Max-Lord. Eliza scolded Alex in the anteroom when none of this was her fault. And Zor, surprisingly, hit it off with Lucy, if only because neither omega wanted to get involved in all the alpha posturing going on in the room. They disappeared off to the labs before dessert. Alura sighed. Why couldn't her family be mostly betas?

After Max-Lord had gone, leaving Alex, who was throwing up in the bathroom with a furious Eliza, and Kara and Alura had yelled at each other for ten minutes until Kara stormed off and slammed her door, Alura had sunk into a chair on the porch and tried to remember how to breathe.

"Hey," Lucy was standing behind her, holding a pot of tea. "Zor-Ze sent me out with this. Are you all right?"

"I'm just sorry I thought inviting someone home for dinner would make this less appalling."

Lucy smiled, shrugging, and poured out two cups. She settled into the chair across from Alura, as if all of the chaos had made her comfortable around her. "Reminded me of home. Me and Dad and Lois had fights so loud that the neighbors called the militia." They sipped tea in silence. "They're pairbonded, aren't they?"

It wasn't a question who she meant. "I don't know how. The compound isn't a prison, but we were careful, once Alex presented."

"Once she told you, you mean."

Alura blinked. "Is this your omega insight?"

Lucy scrunched her nose. "It wasn't as if I could hide it in our family's apartment, but if I had had any chance of not talking about it, I wouldn't have. It's mortifying. Having your body change like that is always mortifying."

Alura nodded. Even for an alpha, the new scents, the arousal, the physical response, they changed everything. If she hadn't had Astra she might have kept it a secret for a long time. Knowing her, she might have kept it a secret for her entire life.

"I know this is one of the great houses," Lucy said. "But if there was any chance they'd bonded, how could you let the marriage happen?"

"Even before they presented I considered it. They've always been close. We thought maybe . . . if they were the same, both alphas or betas--"

"They couldn't marry, but their relationship would be respected. You could have your alliances without _this._ "

Alura nodded. "But then young Alex went into heat and her dam was thrilled that she could be bargained away for leverage. Eliza wanted Lord-Tech and Lord-Tech wanted the In-Ze name. Even if they did bond, mating bites fade without reinforcement. And I'm not Alex's alpha."

"So _y_ _ou_ wouldn't have married her off?"

Alura understood why Eliza had done it, but a house full of these emotion-laden pheromones was exhausting to live in. "Everyone would be so much calmer if Kara took her as a _chatis_."

Lucy's eyes widened. "A _chatis_? You-- wow."

"What?"

Lucy shook her head. "I keep on forgetting that you're one of the great houses. You still take _chatis_."

"My sister has two."

" _Two_?" Lucy gaped. " _And_ an omega wife?"

"No, no. She's not married. I really don't understand how the old alphas managed more than two _chatis_. If they all live together, there's no question that their cycles will sync--"

"It's not that hard."

Alura blinked at her.

Lucy darted her gaze away. "Just keep them pregnant. Then you only cycle once or twice every two years."

"Oh." Alura hadn't thought about that. Modern suppressants reduced the symptoms of heats enough to make them manageable, but birth control was 100% effective. Lucy was right. Gestation resulted in a 16-20 month period without a heat. And in those days, infant mortality was high enough that having a litter every ten months wouldn't cause an explosive population increase.

"You don't have one?"

Alura shook her head.

"But your wife is . . ." Lucy winced, realizing that she was the one with the inappropriate questions this time.

"I manage," Alura said, standing up stiffly. "Would you like me to call a car to take you back to the dorms?"

"I-- no, I can walk, I'm fine."

 _Omegas shouldn't--_ Alura cut herself off before the words came out. "If you're sure."

#

"Lucy!"

The militia station was not somewhere Alura wanted to be past midnight, especially not when Lucy was sitting in one of their uncomfortable chairs with an ice-pack against her bruising face.

"Justice In-Ze, do you know this girl?"

Alura turned on the officer and growled. He jerked back, suddenly scenting strongly of beta, and put his hands up in a submissive posture. Alura flushed with embarrassment.

"Excuse me," she said, and knelt in front of Lucy, reaching up to gently touch the back of her hand. Obediently, Lucy moved the ice-pack and Alura could see the bruising going across her cheekbone and temple and on her forehead. "Are you all right."

Lucy nodded. "Just a . . . misunderstanding."

"I-- we-- um, we apologize so much, Justice In-Ze. We didn't realize she was your _chatis_."

Slowly, Alura stood, glaring down at the cowering officer. "She isn't. She is my intern." She leaned closer to him, restraining her urge to growl but hearing it come out in her voice. "She is my _protégée_. Now please explain why she is injured and in your care."

"I thought they were accosting me," Lucy said. "They thought they were picking me up for streetwalking."

Alura glanced back at her in surprise. She looked lovely, like she always did. A little more dressed up than usual, in a soft velvet dress, like she had gone to a wine tasting hosted by the law guild, which, in fact, was where she had been. Alura had visited for a moment and said hello to a few colleagues before going back to her office. She'd encouraged Lucy to stay for some networking opportunities. And then . . . Lucy had decided to walk home alone, as she did.

"An unaccompanied omega," the officer started to explain. "It's procedure to make certain that they--"

"And what part of _procedure_ is it to make the omega feel like she is being accosted?"

"The officers were in plainclothes . . ."

Alura narrowed her eyes. "Expect a complaint. I assume I was called because she has a head injury and needs to be looked after?"

"Um, well. Since we brought her in we couldn't release her to anyone but a responsible alpha, and she said she didn't have one, but, well . . ."

"I'm sorry," Lucy said. "I guess I figured you were responsible enough to count for anyone's."

Alura looked back at her. "Your sire is off-planet?"

Lucy nodded. "And we don't . . . really speak anymore anyway."

Alura nodded. "Fine. I will sign whatever it is you need." She waved a hand dismissively. "And I expect an internal review of procedures dealing with unaccompanied omegas, or I will make certain there is an external one."

The officer gulped and held out a page for her to scrawl her signature on. Alura was definitely not Lucy's responsible alpha, but this beta was too much of a coward to protest. "Has she had a medical evaluation?"

"I'm fine," Lucy said.

Alura narrowed her eyes at the officer. "I'll take that as a no."

She pushed aside the officer as if he was paper and put her arm around Lucy's shoulders, gently guiding her out of the militia station. "Thanks for getting me out," Lucy said. "I guess this time I'll take you up on a ride to my dorm."

"Oh, we're not going to your dorm," Alura said flatly, urging Lucy into the vehicle.

"Wait, why?"

"You have a head injury. I'm not letting you spend the night alone."

Lucy stared at her, eyes wide as anything. Alura paused, she'd thought they'd gotten past this mostly. "Is that all right?"

Lucy ducked her head. "Yes, alpha."

Alura froze. She went over her actions in the station and grimaced. All alpha, and Lucy had submitted to it because she needed her help, not for any other reason, right? She carefully scented the air. Not heat, just stress and exhaustion and need--the poor thing had had a traumatic evening. She needed to be looked after. But Alura wasn't the right person to do that, was she?

Alura started driving toward the In-Ze compound. If it were Alex she'd do the same. Lucy didn't have a responsible alpha and she was taking on that role, if only for the night. And that meant it was her job to look after her not only legally and physically, but emotionally.

"Come along." Alura helped Lucy out of the vehicle and up the stairs. She hesitated for a moment, and then led her into one of the guest rooms. Lucy sniffed for a moment, and then softened, shoulders slumping, dejected. "Would you prefer . . . my room?"

Lucy nodded, and then, for the first time, she leaned against Alura, pressing her head into her side. "Your scent makes me feel safe."

Alura led the way down the hall to her den. Zor had his own down the hall, and they hadn't been together in long enough that his scent was entirely gone. "Sit here," Alura said, guiding Lucy to the side of the bed. "Let me check your head." Astra had gotten enough blows to the head that Alura had this down to a science.

Lucy was strangely pliant under her instructions. "Does it hurt?"

Lucy nodded. "I feel sick to my stomach too."

Alura growled. "You have a concussion. I am going to make sure those officers never work again."

Lucy breathed out a laugh. "Why do I feel better when you growl? It always used to--"

Alura settled in beside her and Lucy leaned into her. Alura put her cool fingers on Lucy's forehead and Lucy pressed her ear to her chest, from where a rumbling purr came. "Tell me."

"My sire would get angry, mostly at my sister--she was an alpha too. But when they started growling it always freaked me out. And then with James . . ."

"A-- companion?" Alura wasn't sure how to ask this.

"Heat buddy." Lucy huffed out a breath. "More, for a bit. He wanted me, but I wanted to go to school. And people are still weird about married omegas joining a guild."

It was different if you married after you qualified--one of the reasons Zor was so much older than her. But she was right. Married omegas were thought to have other responsibilities.

"The last few fights-- they were pretty rough also. But you're different."

"I hope you know I'll never growl at you."

Lucy nodded. "Can I sleep now?"

"Of course. You need to rest. I'll wake you in two hours."

Lucy curled up into a tiny ball and snuggled into Alura's waist. Alura draped herself around her, and resigned herself to spending the night watching her sleep. As she tangled her fingers in Lucy's soft hair, she couldn't think of anything she would rather do. Lucy needed protection. Perhaps how she felt was simply an alpha urge, but it was right to protect Lucy. She would rather protect Lucy than do anything else in the world.

#

"How's your head?"

Lucy, stubborn as always, had only spent two days at home before she showed up in Alura's office looking for work to do. She'd complained that she was bored and that all she wanted to do at home was read, and that was no better than actually working. Alura watched her forehead for the telltale sign of headache--the furrow between her brows--and then stopped them both and made Lucy go for a walk to not look at the case files anymore.

Lucy made a face. "If I say fine are you going to pull an alpha on me?"

"I'm your supervisor. I don't have to be an alpha to tell you to put the files down and come out into the garden."

Lucy grinned and abandoned her work. Things felt different now. Lucy walked closer to her, and it felt like Alura, a step behind, could encompass her with her arm if she wanted to. She did want to, but that would be a little much for the gardens of the law compound. The night Lucy had spent in her bed had changed things. After the first few times, waking Lucy up hadn't sent a strange tightness through her chest. Lucy would just grumble at her and go back to sleep. But it had changed something unexpected and into something that felt necessary.

In the morning, after Alura had taken Lucy home and settled her in her own bed, Kara had walked into Alura's den and her eyes had gone wide with the omega scent in there. She had made a lot of confused faces.

"I didn't ask when your room smelled like this after Alex stayed over," Alura reminded her.

Kara gaped. "But you-- you forbade us to have sleepovers after she presented, even if she was nowhere near heat!"

"But did I say anything when you did it anyway?"

Caught, and confused, Kara failed to ask further questions.

It was all undefined. But knowing that Lucy trusted her enough to ask her for help when she needed it, that she felt safe sleeping in her den, it was a good feeling.

"Were you serious about making sure they reviewed the way they dealt with unaccompanied omegas?" Lucy asked, as they circled the giant sentient aspidistra, gently waving its spiky leaves to create a light breeze.

"Of course. I've already sent in the complaint."

"Thanks." Lucy ducked her head. "You know, I've never minded being an omega. That's just what I am. I can see the appeal of being a different genera, but none of them made any more sense to me than being an omega. I take pride in it, even. I'm proud of all the omegas who have done so much even with the world against them. I know it makes things harder, but it was never going to stop me from trying. I thought if I was tough enough, if I was smart enough, that I could manage. My sire taught me that." Lucy paused, and then a softening of her shoulders revealed her hurt. "And then he showed me he didn't believe it."

"Lucy . . ." What was there to say to that?

Lucy glanced over her shoulder at Alura, making a wry sort of face. It was so strange, how sometimes it was clear that Lucy was nearly as young as Alex, and other times it was even clearer that she had these deep quiet wounds inside that had scabbed over, like an adult's. Alex's were still red and raw.

"It was almost funny. He _hated_ my boyfriend, James. James--he's a good alpha, and he never rose to my sire's bait. But he seethed about it afterwards. My sire was just waiting for me to get rid of him, I was sure. And then I told him that I'd applied to the law guild, and that I'd turned down James's offer of marriage, and my sire recoiled. 'How could you be so _stupid_?' I'd had a sure thing, an alpha, who'd protect me. We'd pairbonded even. And I'd instead decided to risk everything on a career that is notoriously anti-omega. In his eyes, I'd blown it."

"But--" Alura could not quite get her head around this. "How could he not see how suited you are to this profession? It's not you that would lose out if you did not come here, it's us."

Lucy's smile with wet eyes hurt to look at. "Yes, well, perhaps that was part of it. After his discharge he was a little less altruistic about 'for the good of Krypton.'"

"He still should not have taken it out on you."

"Yeah, well. After fighting with him I went to James, because even if we weren't going to get married, we were still pairbonded." Lucy rubbed the back of her neck. "I'd had his mark for going on two years. But he told me that my sire was right, that I should reconsider, and I just-- no one was going to support me in this. I had to do it without an alpha, without any alpha. That's why I didn't have anyone else to call."

"I'm glad I could be there for you." Alura found it hard to keep her eyes off the back of Lucy's neck. She'd been pairbonded, and then had to feel the bond break down and fade. With Zor it had been a commitment, not a true romantic attachment or a passionate connection. And while that was in the forefront of both their minds, their bond had maintained. Then, it seemed, they had both forgotten it, and the bond was gone. But Lucy had had a strong bond and had ended the relationship at its height, forcing the bond to break. How much had that hurt her? Enough that she would not even risk heat-sex with another alpha it seemed. There was not even a heat-partner she trusted enough to call.

"I wanted to say how grateful I am," Lucy said, expression fiercely earnest. "I feel respected by you. You see my genera, but you don't let it change the way you treat me. I know it must not be easy for you. I always hear people wondering why you picked me as your intern--or thinking they know why. I'm used to that kind of comment about me. But it's hard to hear them be so disrespectful to you. As if you would ever use your status to gain a bed partner. If you wanted a _chatis_ you would just have to snap your fingers to get a dozen offers." Lucy flushed and ducked her head. "I mean-- I just wanted to thank you, for being able to take care of me without losing respect for me, for not treating me like just an omega."

The words landed heavily in Alura's chest. What had she been doing but thinking of Lucy as an alpha would think of a prospective _chatis_? Lucy was far too special to treat like that. And people were gossiping about it? If she allowed anything to happen while Lucy was in her employ, it could ruin all of the good Alura hoped to do for Lucy's future. Favoritism and nepotisitic placement of _chatis_ had been a form of rampant corruption in previous guild regimes. Any hint of that could ruin the career of someone of a no-house family. And Lucy had too much to overcome already. Alura took a long slow breath. "It has been easy for me," Alura said. "Because you are so exceptional, and I do not mean for an omega, or even for a third-year student. How can I not respect that?"

Lucy grinned, then dipped her head, embarrassed, and recovered, smiling straight at Alura, bright as the sun.

#

Everything back at the compound was disastrous. Kara, in a fury, had smashed up her research, swearing that she didn't care about science and she was going to join the military guild.

This was obviously triggered by Max-Lord going back into space and Alex coming back around full of a bitter sort of resignation and smelling like him.

"Where's the bite, Kara?" Alura asked.

Kara had turned, wildly infuriated. "What?"

"I know you have to have bitten her. Your responses are too hormonal to be simply emotional."

Kara flinched. Slowly, she reached up and touched her neck, just above her hairline. Alura shut her eyes. Well, at least they'd put some thought into that. Perhaps.

"Why did this have to happen?" Kara's voice was shaking. "Why couldn't-- Why couldn't you have done something?"

"It wasn't my decision to make," Alura said.

"Why wasn't it _Alex's?_ "

That was the question, wasn't it? Lucy had an offer, and had said no. Her father hadn't approved, but he hadn't overridden her decision. It was funny, how the great houses were backwards in all their own way. They had adopted political marriage as a superior modern replacement for the barbaric biology of mating bites, but they were the slowest in adapting to the concept of treating omegas as self-determining Kryptonian citizens. Did they treat any of their children as self-determining citizens? Arranged marriages, entailed properties, these were all ways of subordinating the individual to the house. Alura's own marriage, though not unpleasant, had been for the good of the house, not her good. Kara's would also be for the house.

But the house gave more than it took away. Perhaps it did not allow a free self-determination, but it gave status and influence, unimportant in themselves, but so important for what you could do with them. Putting the group, the pack, the community above your own fate, that was what houses were about. Alex _had_ chosen. She had put her duty to her family first.

"You have to let her go, Kara."

Kara's eyes were wide and blue and oh-so-sad. This was her child, her daughter--the family the strength of the house was supposed to let her protect--and still she suffered.

#

Much Kryptonian legal precedent had been written by the great houses, in order to protect themselves. But there was an older law also, a bloody law, based on the pack structure that still underlay Kryptonian society. The absolute authority of the alpha over the lives of his pack-members had been slowly chipped away. But remnants lingered. The old belief that female alphas were biological abominations--able to both become pregnant and make others pregnant--had been rooted out, and female alphas given the same status as male alphas in nearly all situations. The legal status of pairbonds, marked from the heat in which the bite had been given, was still a bit of a puzzle. Legal marriages--originally a beta reification of the pairbond relationship--overrode most pairbonds, such as with _chatis_ , but pairbonds could be registered as the primary relationship if a mating bite maintained for at least the interval between heats. Out in the countryside, in a few communities, marriage was still only a beta practice, and even unregistered pairbonds had primary status. It created quite the legal pickle on occasion.

They were embroiled in one of these cases where an inheritance was being disputed between an unregistered but long term bond-mate and an alienated parent. It was frustratingly technical, and Alura and Lucy had been working on it for nearly a week already.

Kara was still driving her mad, as she had gone through with her application to the military guild, fought with Alex over it, and was pacing the entire compound as it became clear that Alex was going into heat again. It was probably a boon that they weren't talking.

But oddly it was Lucy who had gotten twitchy lately.

Alura had accepted that her affection for Lucy might be tinged with alpha hormones, but it was also the pride of a mentor for a protégée, and the admiration of--she hoped--a friend. But lately, Lucy had come in smelling even sweeter, like ripe figs and heady lemongrass. Though her concussion had healed, she was only able to sit and work for short stretches, and then she'd jump up and hurry out, coming back in a few minutes, smelling even sweeter and more distracting.

"Ugh, I'm tired," Lucy mumbled once, as it was getting later in the evening. She pulled her chair close to Alura's and without so much as a pause, pressed against her side, burrowing her head into her shoulder and tugging Alura's arm around her back.

It was . . . adorable. And it was almost a stereotypically omega action. Alura said nothing, but let her stay there, absently stroking her arm, and waiting as Lucy's breath evened for a moment, and then she woke herself up and hurriedly moved away.

"We should probably call it a night," Alura said, and Lucy stood there, looking tense and caught, and then nodded. She left quickly, leaving behind such a lovely scent. Alura rested her head in her hands. How had it taken her this long to figure out? Lucy was going into heat. How long was she going to keep coming in? If she already smelled like _that,_ tomorrow . . . it wasn't going to be good.

Lucy showed up anyway. Alura considered calling in herself just to avoid the temptation, but the trial was coming up far too quickly. Stubbornly, Lucy settled in at her desk. Alura could see the sweat darkening the hair at her temples, could do nothing but scent the heady pheromones rising from her neck and underarms. It sent little lines of fire down Alura's back and into her core. Her hindbrain lit up, firing foolish alpha thoughts-- _mine, safe, pups_. She felt it in her hands and her chest--tight and close--and she found herself staring at the sweat, at the shakes in Lucy's grip on the pen, and she fought the urge to swoop down and drag her away from the desk. She should be in a warm den, wrapped in soft blankets that would not chafe her sensitive skin. She needed to be held and petted and fed. She shouldn't be _here_.

Lucy glanced up and saw Alura watching her. Alura didn't look away. Lucy's eyes went wide, pupils blown, her lips parting. She licked her lips-- and that was enough.

Alura rose too quickly, chair tumbling to the ground, and in one step she'd caught Lucy--who had also staggered to her feet--and slammed her against the wall.

Lucy gasped, limp in her grip, and this close the scent of figs and lemongrass was so strong it felt like Alura would drown in it. Alura drew her in, tight to her chest, burying her nose in the crook of Lucy's neck, mouthing at it, barely able to keep herself from sinking her teeth in. She dragged them along the skin and Lucy gave a rattling groan and arched into her.

"You can't _do_ this," Alura hissed. "Yes, I respect you, but we are what we are, and if you come into my lair smelling like heat and desire, that is an _offer_ and I will take you up on it."

Lucy was shaking in her arms, her breath coming fast and rough, like she was hyperventilating. Alura forced her back against the wall. Lucy's eyes were so wide, and yet hazed. This was heat, too strong to think through, too all encompassing to do anything but beg. She let out a soft whimper, jerked her hips forward, and groped helplessly at Alura's forearms.

"Is that a yes? 'Please take me, have me, knot me, alpha.' Is that what you are saying? 'I said I was going to do it alone, I said I was strong, but I am just a pretty little omega girl who cannot function without an alpha's knot, filling me, breeding me.'" Alura cupped her, and through robes and underlinens, thick as they were, she could feel the heat, the tacky wetness, and Lucy's eyes flooded with shame, lashes dropping over them, lip quivering. Her shoulders dipped, but she didn't pull away.

She didn't have that kind of strength, not in a heat like this. Even if she wanted to say no, her body had taken that decision from her.

Alura dropped her like her touch burned. She hit the call menu. "I need a car with an omega escort, please."

"Right away, Justice In-Ze."

Alura turned back to Lucy, who had her fists balled, her head ducked, her teeth clenched. She was fighting. Clearly she hadn't expected it to get this bad this fast. "Do you have somewhere safe to go?"

Lucy nodded, not looking up.

"Good. Be safe. Be _safe_ , omega. If there is one thing I cannot control it is my need for you to be safe."

What else could she have done?

#

Lucy emerged from total silence after a week, the trial a disaster, but thankfully over. She came in, standing a good five feet away from Alura, and put a form on her desk. "Thank you for the opportunity to work with you," she said. "I'm scheduled to take the qualifying exam in a month and I would like to have more time to study."

"I understand," Alura said. "You can count on a positive recommendation from me."

Lucy winced, a tight smile crossing her face.

And then she was gone, and she didn't come back.

She passed her exams with flying colors, of course. Alura was not surprised at all.

"You know how I ride my assistants," she told other legal guild-members at a gossipy dinner. "She lasted far longer than I expected."

"It probably helped that she was a little in love with you," a beta from the office across the way said.

Alura flinched. "She was never anything but professional."

"Not the point. You, In-Ze, are the worst slavedriver I've ever met. She'd have to have been crushing hard to make it through the first three weeks."

Her office felt empty, the scent of figs and lemongrass, the scent of Lucy fading from it, but sometimes reemerging in a whiff, and hurting even more. Lucy had been warmth and stability when home wasn't that.

Alura went to graduation. She was going to bring flowers, but it just felt wrong. Instead she emptied out her favorite file case and tied a bow around it. On stage, Lucy looked determined and proud and accomplished.

There was a man with Lucy at the end of it. Young and big and stinking of alpha pheromones. Lucy caught sight of Alura and froze. Then she swallowed and stepped forward. "Justice In-Ze."

"Congratulations." No other words seemed apparent.

Lucy glanced up at the alpha at her shoulder. "Um, this is James."

 _James_.

The pairbond.

Had he come groveling when it was clear she was going to graduate easily? With Alura's letter she already had an assistantship for the next year. Had she gone to him when she needed someone? When Alura had turned her away for fear-- for fear of worse than this? It was hard to imagine what could feel worse than knowing she'd turned to him. Alura held out the case.

"I-- I didn't have time to get flowers. But, thank you, Lucy. I doubt I will ever have an assistant as helpful and reliable as you."

Lucy looked from the case to her, heard the lie in her words, and reached out, hands shaking a little. James looked startled and sniffed, and then Alura caught out the confusion in her scent. Confusion, carried on something like need.

But that was over now. Alura excused herself and left.

#

As if by some twin telepathy, Astra rolled into town that weekend, with her two mouthy _chatis_ in tow, stinking like the onset of heat.

"Come on. You'll die of self control. Rut it out, it's healthy."

Alura sank into her arms and breathed her in.

Leslie bit at Astra's fingers as she was fed linnaberries and had her legs wrapped around Maggie's waist, feet in her lap. Hedonists, slaves to pleasure, they called omegas. But here, as heat slowly set in, no one had to fight that accusation. And Alura found herself curling up around Maggie's small shape, pulling her in between her legs, letting her nails run along her scalp and tugging, plaiting tiny braids into her hair. Maggie purred into her neck, licking at her collarbone, and care and protectiveness and desire all merged into one.

This is what it was to be an alpha, pure, unfiltered.

Astra had Leslie wrapped up from behind, teeth sinking into her shoulder, fingers buried in her. Pheromones were thick in the room, tasting like acid and electricity and forest. Alura held Maggie's wrists behind her, watching her squirm, watching her scent the air and jerk her hips and beg, as if it didn't matter. As if nothing would change after it was over.

She was straight and sturdy and at peace with being taken by an alpha, with fucking and knotting and heats. A dark mark on her already tan neck showed the outline of Astra's teeth. She was wet enough that Alura could see it, slick and shiny on her thighs, as she kicked her heels into the floor to raise her hips, her knees spread wide. She was begging, marked more with Alura's teeth across her arms and breasts and belly and thighs, whimpering nonsense words full of need. This was what she was made for. This was what omegas were made for.

Alura rutted against her, and Maggie's legs locked around her, dragging her in. Pulling one of her hands free, Maggie groped at Alura, fingers burrowing inside her to guide her knot out of its hood, gripping her firmly as she grew with sympathetic rut. Maggie arched against her,capturing her swell inside her, and Alura growled at the force, angry at being controlled, and also aroused by it, roused into violence. She grasped Maggie's waist and thrust, pounding against her, in and out and Maggie was yelping and struggling and desperately squirming against her. Alura grit her teeth and slowed down, so slow that the agonized moan that spilled from Maggie's chest was like music.

She came on her knot, crying about its size, begging to be bred and filled with pups, and went limp under her, tilting her head to show her neck, as they lay locked together, sweaty and rather uncomfortable. Alura could feel her heartbeat where her tight chamber encased her knot. She could see it matched in the skin of her neck. But though the skin on the unmarked side of her throat was temptingly smooth, it was not enticing enough for her to do more than press her mouth against it. Astra and Leslie moved in, with wet cloths and kisses, and the heat continued. Always excessive, and always inspiring.

"You clung to her a lot this time," Leslie said, lazily drinking from a bottle and watching where Maggie was still curled into Alura's chest, Astra passed out against her back.

"She's little. It just felt . . . natural."

Leslie nodded, as if that made perfect sense. "Yeah, sometimes I like to lie on top of her and squash her."

Alura narrowed her eyes. "You're not any bigger than her."

"Still like to."

Unsurprising really.

"Please don't," Maggie said from half under Alura. "I'm squashed enough."

The grin on Leslie's face was surprisingly affectionate. Alura supposed they must like each other, or the days would get trying.

Maggie squirmed around and looped her arms around Alura's neck, burrowing into her. Usually, after heat, they were mostly uninterested. This was new.

"You smell sad," Maggie murmured. "I sometimes feel sad after heat, but it's usually just my body going 'why aren't you pregnant?'"

Leslie choked. "I don't think that's the issue."

"I dunno. Maybe alpha's bodies go, that girl doesn't smell pregnant. What the fuck have you been doing?"

"I'm fine," Alura said, before the conjecture could continue. "I feel better than I have in a while. Thank you for looking after me."

Maggie snorted into her shoulder. "I always liked you."

"Really?" Leslie wrinkled her nose.

Alura arched an eyebrow and Leslie giggled and squirmed. "Shove up," she told Maggie, and they both hung on to Alura.

"I like how you're kind of shit at being an alpha."

"Oh, thank you," Alura mumbled, feeling quite bad at it now. It was after heat and she was still under a pile of omegas. Was this normal?

"People forget that alphas and omegas are two sides of one coin. Omegas go into heat and can't refuse a fucking? Alphas scent a heated up omega and forget to ask if they want a fucking. You don't forget."

"And then I give up the chance at heat sex."

"Yeah, well," Leslie cut in. "90% of the time, omegas aren't in heat. That time's important too."

Alura nodded. She missed that. "She was my friend," she said. "I'm sorry about losing that the most."

#


	2. Chapter 2

Lucy had lost the plot a long time ago, she realized, scrunched up on her bed, fist bunched between her legs, trapped in the middle interval of heat, where the need clutched deep in her stomach, but contact felt like it came through a glitchy interface, the responses a mix of pain and numbness. It had always been important to remember what she was. She was an omega, proud of that, angry that it was harder, frustrated that every alpha in the room thought it was their right to second guess her choices. But it wasn't all about her. Her existence, her scent, they changed things for other people too. The relationship was symmetric. Alphas pushed on her and she pushed on them.

She'd forgotten that. She'd thought, maybe, that because Alura didn't push, it was because Lucy didn't push her either. But that wasn't the case. Alura didn't push because she made the effort not to. Lucy--calling her for help, sleeping in her bed, coming to see her while heat hormones were making her flood the room with pheromones--Lucy hadn't made an effort at all. It had been completely inappropriate, and an abuse of the honor of being given that internship in the first place. All she had wanted was for Alura to be completely professional, and she had been, and Lucy had not given her that respect in return.

Lucy extracted her hand and lay flat on her face on the bed. This was the part where having a good alpha made all the difference, where having someone to hold her and talk to her and distract her from the infuriating contradiction that was her body needing more but having had too much was so much more important than the size of their knot.

Lucy reached out and poked at her screen, starting up the recording of one of her lectures, and let it play. The dry professorial voice made her itch. Lucy's finger slipped and a voice memo came on, Alura, calling a few days before, with some observations about one of the precedents, talking about work. But her voice was warm and thoughtful and authoritative, and Lucy sank back into the blankets, letting the memo repeat, as she waited for the heat hormones to work themselves out of her system.

 _Mine_ , Lucy thought, digging her fingernails into her shoulder in a pretend sort of bite. _My alpha._

_#_

Ending the internship was the right thing to do. Calling James when she'd heard she passed had been an impulse--possibly with the intent to gloat, or show him up. But he'd been so happy for her. And he felt like a safety net. She didn't trust herself when the heat hormones came anymore. If she had an alpha to focus on, to look after her, she wasn't likely to try to hunt down her former supervisor, who had very clearly shown her lack of interest, and her impossibly admirable self control.

It was mortifying, seeing Alura at graduation, taking the soft leather file folder, that smelled so strongly like her, seeing it for what it was, a reminder that their relationship was professional, that they had worked well together. But she'd given her something scent-marked, something that felt like it was meant to be a reminder of her presence, her authority, her care. Lucy was supposed to use it, carry around her important cases in it, but all she wanted was to bring it into her nest and rub her face against the worn leather, scenting the oils Alura's hands had left on the rough edges.

That was something so many people didn't understand. Not any alpha. This one, her body said. _This one_.

It was hard, knowing that her body had chosen, but it was a completely inappropriate choice. Justice In-Ze, of the great house of Ze, married, with a daughter nearly as old as Lucy . . . with kind eyes and a steel intellect and a scent like old books and caramel syrup.

Of course the law-guild was all one complex of buildings, and Lucy, assisting a group of barristers, none as demanding as Alura, even all put together, couldn't help passing her offices or seeing her in a group event.

Taking a shortcut through the gardens, she saw her once, with another woman--one who looked just like her. Her sister. They were laughing, Alura seeming surprised at it, her face crinkled up in pleasure, leaning in for a nuzzle. Her sister, tangling her fingers in her hair, equally easy. Packmates.

It had been so hard to get her head around the concept of _chatis_ _,_ "rut-servant". There was a hierarchy in that, a possession and a servitude that made Lucy recoil. But it was a term belonging to the great houses, the ones who remembered that they were once packs, that there was not a single Alpha-Omega relationship that everything else turned around. Relationships were complicated. Pairbonds were confusing. Heats and ruts required attention even if there was no spouse or mate at hand. _Chatis_ were an extension of the family, a gift of pack status and pack protection, finding a place to be part of, to stand, so you never had to face the world alone.

But save for the great houses, that wasn't the way people did things anymore. For an omega, there were two choices: find an alpha and give yourself to them or try and control everything it meant to be an omega. Overcome being an omega. Prove you were just as good or better, just to be treated like a person and not an object.

Lucy had made her choice. She wasn't changing her mind now.

#

Alex was waiting in Alura's bedroom, curled up on her bed, the blankets wrapped over her shoulders and bunched on her lap. She peeked up from the nest she'd made, cheeks streaked with tears, and Alura felt her chest close, the fury and care rushing down her back, making her want to growl. She didn't, and instead settled onto the bed, drawing Alex into her lap.

Alex let out a small whimper and pressed her face into Alura's shoulder. Alura mussed her hair and purred, making sure she felt safe. Alex's scent was rich and thick and heavy, with none of the edge of heat, just an unaccustomed expansiveness, and anguish making the peaty coffee aroma turn bitter.

Suspicious, Alura let her hand slide down Alex's side, cupping her stomach, and Alex let out a tiny sob.

"Alex," Alura murmured into her ear. "Talk to me, please."

Alex nuzzled deeper into her arms, and Alura could feel wet tears on her shoulder. "Alpha," the word was breathy and weak, and shot straight into Alura's adrenaline centers. "Help."

#

When Lucy opened the door she froze. She should have been able to smell this, to sense this. But she hadn't. Alura was on her doorstep, a raincape wrapped tightly around her, her head bowed. She looked up when the door opened, and her eyes were wide and hollow with something utterly unfamiliar.

"What are you doing here?"

Alura let out a breath, and put her hand up to her head, brushing loose hair back behind her ear. "I need to speak with you."

" _Why_?"

Alura's lips parted, but no words came out. She smelled dark and strange, with an omega scent on her that Lucy knew but couldn't place. It said enough. Lucy took a short breath through her mouth and stepped aside. "Come in."

She'd moved out of the dorm, into an apartment, not one of the ones with the doormen and buzzers for omegas alone, just a normal one--stupid or not. She had nesting pillows scattered all over the living room, which was embarrassing. But Alura moved to the sofa and pulled a pillow into her lap, as if she needed the comfort, so maybe it wasn't embarrassing after all.

Lucy settled down in a chair across from her, distant enough to not be compelled to touch. "What's wrong?"

Alura let out a long breath. "Alex is whelping."

Oh. This was a family thing. Lucy grimaced, remembering the horrible first dinner she'd spent at the In-Ze compound. "Is Kara--"

"Honestly?" Alura laughed. "I have no idea how Kara is. I don't even know if she knows yet. Alex came to me. She's missed one heat and she knows. And the math doesn't work. She's whelping, but she shouldn't be whelping. If she's only missed one heat, that means the one before was the one--"

"The one where Kara was flying off the handle and Alex's husband was off-planet?" She remembered Alura expressing her frustrations about Kara. Lucy had been in her own pre-heat, and the anger had been as attractive as the urge to comfort her.

"If he _touches_ Alex in retribution he will have the wrath of my entire house coming down on him. She is _mine_ and I wish that I had--" Alura bit off the end of her words, covering her mouth so as not to show her bared teeth.

Lucy nodded.

"I don't like playing games of rank. I am not interested in being the dominant alpha in every situation. But if people are going to be _stupid--_ "

"He could use the pups as leverage."

Alura nodded.

It was a very grey area. Marriage laws had been constructed to protect pack bloodlines. That was one reason the term _chatis_ had become degraded. Their litters no longer legally passed on the name of the house. Only the married partner carried the bloodline to their offspring. The one place an alpha's bloodright was still supported was in cases like this. A bonded partner--bonded through marriage or a mating bite--producing a litter from a different alpha was a basic betrayal of the whole legal structure's intent.

"He wouldn't actually _kill_ them, would he? People don't--" People didn't do that anymore, did they? But even the threat of it, knowing that it was within his rights . . . Alura just stared at her, unable to reassure her one way or another. Lucy breathed out. "This is . . . pretty awful. But-- why come to me?"

Alura dropped her face into her hands, and then lifted her head. "Honestly? I am too upside-down and sideways to manage precedent right now."

"Wait." Lucy found herself on her knees in front of Alura's sofa, her hand on her thigh. "You came to _me_ for legal advice?"

"I just want to rip someone limb from limb, and I cannot quite decide who." Alura huffed out a laugh. "Of course I came to you. You're my protégée."

#

"Hi, I'm Lucy Sam-Lane, from the law guild."

Alex took in Lucy's presence in her den with a flinch, and then rose up, startled. She stuck her hand through her hair, sending the short strands sticking out at odd angles. "Wait-- you? But you're . . . like me."

"I'm also an assistant adjudicator. I'm here to help you figure out what to do."

"But--" Alex approached her and leaned in, sniffing lightly. "How?"

"The hard way," Lucy said. "I also didn't have any of this great-house garbage messing me up. If we can sort this out, maybe you can have a chance to do whatever it is you want to do."

Alex moved away, reaching out for a cupboard, then pulling her hand away and drawing a glass of water instead. "All I do is make things worse. The only thing-- the only thing I wanted was to protect Kara, and I fucked that up before I even turned fifteen."

Lucy watched her pace, seeing the sinewyness in her, considered unappealing in an omega, her height, also a little above standard for a female omega. No one would have guessed, before she presented. Lucy, half a foot shorter than her littermate, hadn't been a surprise. She puffed out a breath. "I wanted military guild too. I wanted to be like my alpha dad."

Alex's shoulders drooped. "My dad wasn't an alpha. But I still wanted to be like him. He died protecting Zor-Ze. He gave himself for this house. I wanted to give myself to this house."

"What happened with Kara?"

Alex jerked to the side, as if even the question was a blow. "I was supposed to be the one protecting her. But I--"

Lucy watched her face, saw the shame on it. Some things were clicking together. "You went into heat."

"She was a kid. She didn't know what I wanted." Alex rubbed the back of her hand over her eyes. "She hadn't even presented yet. And I just--"

"You feel like you took advantage."

Alex glared at her. "You know what it's like. Haven't you ever pheromone flooded someone who didn't want to be flooded?"

Lucy flinched. "Yes. But I was an adult. You were a kid in your first heat. You weren't responsible for that."

"I was responsible for looking after Kara. And instead I begged her to fuck me, to bite me. And she was scared. I can remember how scared she was, and how she held on, trying to figure out what I needed. And she bit me and," Alex shook her head. She reached up, sliding her fingers up the back of her neck, under her hair. "It was supposed to fade."

"Fifteen? You've been mated for--"

"Eight years."

Lucy had to sit down. "Shit."

"I tried so hard to get it to break. I was . . . a knothead to her. I left for two years, training off-planet to learn to fight. But it never faded, and Kara kept-- she kept making stupid decisions because of me. It was like I'd bound her to me, and she wouldn't let go, even though I'm _useless_."

"So when your dam suggested a marriage . . ."

Alex nodded. "I figured it would do the job, finally end this. But I--" She swallowed, looking down. "Do you know how wrong it feels to let someone touch you in your heat when its not _your_ alpha?"

Lucy made a face, nodding. She'd tried heat-buddies while her bond with James was breaking, and it hadn't been pleasant.

"And it didn't work. It just made her more jealous and angry and upset, and, Rao, she was threatening to challenge him to a duel or something, and wanted to join the military guild, and I needed her to _stop_. So-- I let her have me."

"You'd stopped taking birth control?"

Alex nodded weakly. "Not for her."

"Fuck."

Alex crawled onto her sofa and hunched, pulling a collection of pillows around her into a small barrier. "She deserves better than me." She wrapped her arms around herself, cupping her hands around her stomach. "She deserves better than us."

Lucy blew her hair off her face. "Pairbonds are a two-way street, omega."

"Pairbonds are a hormonal imbalance."

"Life is a hormonal imbalance, Alex. Sometimes you just have to roll with it."

#

Kara sniffed deeply and her eyes went wide. "You're mom's . . . friend."

That was a reaction. Lucy nodded. "I was her intern. I'm an assistant adjudicator now. She asked me to look at your case."

Kara settled down on crossed legs, bringing her alpha-stature into a reasonable range for Lucy to look at. She ducked her head, pulling her hair down in front of her face and tangling her fingers through it. "I don't know what to do."

"Why don't you tell me what you did do?"

Kara went limp. "I gave in."

Lucy turned her pen in her fingers and watched her. Alura's alpha daughter--what kind of alpha was she?

"I just don't-- no one told me how to deal with this. Mom's just above it all, and Aunt Astra doesn't even seem to care. But Alex-- Alex is _mine_. And I don't know what that means, it doesn't mean anything as far as I can tell, but I know it, and I can't bear knowing it and not being able to do anything about it."

"What do you want to do about it?"

Kara sank. "Boss her around."

Lucy raised an eyebrow.

"I know it's wrong. I know that respecting an omega means respecting their choices. It means that you have to be careful. When an omega is in heat it's hard for them to make decisions, and assuming that just because they ask for something when they're in heat they really want it is dangerous."

Of course Kara was _this_ kind of alpha. How could you grow up with Alura as your sire and not end up with an overactive sense of correct behavior? Lucy chewed her lip, distracted by the memory of Alura, fierce and overwhelmed, pressing her against the wall, wanting her. There was no truth there. Her heat and how she'd flooded the place with pheromones made everyone's behavior suspect.

"But she makes me so mad!"

Lucy couldn't help but grin at this.

"She keeps staying away from me and telling me it's for my own good! She keeps hurting herself and telling me that it's not my job to take care of her! And she flipped out at me when I applied to the military guild, because she doesn't need me to fight for her! She needs me to let her go, but I _can't_." Kara wrapped her arms around herself. "And I really can't now. I didn't mean to, I promise, I just-- she was angry at me, and I wanted to say sorry, and then she was in pain and I just . . . it's so hard to see her in pain. I just wanted to hold her, and she clung to me, and then--" It seemed impossible for Kara to make herself any smaller, but she did. "--she licked me."

"She licked you."

"And so I kissed her, and then her hands were under my clothes, and I kind of lost control."

Lucy nodded. "How often do you join her for heat sex?"

Kara's eyes widened. "What?"

"I assume that her marriage was a sign she wanted to stop. But before that? Also, can you tell me how you pairbonded, for corroboration?"

"We didn't."

"Didn't pairbond?"

Kara shook her head. "No, no we did that. We were camping, and Alex started feeling really sick, so I put her to bed, and cuddled with her, and she kept getting worse, and I wanted to call for a rescue, but she told me it was heat, and that all she needed was me. When she showed me her neck, I couldn't help myself. But then we pretended it hadn't happened, and didn't talk about it. And we didn't do it again, not until . . . last time."

"You've been pairbonded for eight years and not been having heat sex?" these poor _kids_. Lucy couldn't believe it. Was iron self-control a house of Ze quality?

Kara shrugged. "I help out friends sometimes."

Lucy frowned. "Has she come to you? Has she asked you to be her heat-partner?"

"Only when she's already all pheromone-y, and well, that means I can't."

How could Kara want her, be pairbonded to her, and still deny her? Lucy swallowed. She knew the idea that an omega couldn't say no during a heat was garbage. It was easy to say no to an alpha you didn't want. And she knew, intellectually, that alphas could control themselves. Should. But this much?

_Alura's mouth on her neck, just the hint of teeth--teeth she wanted, so much. Pulling away, her words cruel, dismissive._

Lucy shook it off. Alex's hunched shape, her arms curled around her still flat belly, took its place. No wonder she thought Kara deserved better.

Lucy reached out and took Kara's hand. "If we get you out of this, I'm going to have something to say. But first things first. I'm not the kind of omega who hates myself for having physiological reactions and succumbing to my biological imperative. Like, it's embarrassing, but it isn't a source of shame for me. Alex . . . has a lot of shame. And you being kind of perfect, only makes her feel worse about her own need. So, you know, I hate to say this, but playing up the--you're so attractive, I struggle to control my alpha desires around you--could be helpful here."

"Yes, well," Kara ducked her head. "Not being able to control my alpha desires was what got us in this mess in the first place."

#

"He knew about it," Alex had said. "It amused him. He liked rubbing my bite while he was in me, asking me how it felt that it wasn't her. The thing that intrigued him most, I think, was that I'd tried to reject it, and it was still there. 'How would Kara feel if she knew what I was doing to you?' he'd asked. 'What do you think she'd give me to get me to stop?'"

Her hands stayed guardedly over her belly and a muscle in her jaw flexed as she set her teeth in a deadly fierce scowl. Lucy'd seen that kind of scowl on omegas before. Alphas might be the ones known to be protective, but you didn't get between an omega and their pups. "I had to go to my alpha for help. Even if he wouldn't hurt them, he'd just wait until he could use them to his best advantage. And he wouldn't care who got hurt then."

'My alpha'? She'd gone to Alura, not Max, not Kara, not Eliza. And then it made sense. She'd gone to the alpha of her house. She'd acknowledged the pack structure that so many people these days forgot was there.

Lucy wondered what it would be like to be in that kind of structure. Her sister had moved off-planet; she didn't talk to her dad. James didn't have that kind of family. It would be nice to have that sort of support, even if it came with demands.

She had to figure out how to fix it. Alura had chosen Lucy to be the one to help her pack. Maybe it was even better than being picked to be part of it.

_Maybe not._

#

Alura looked up as Lucy strode into her office with her file folder stuffed to bursting. Shebegan to lay things out on Alura's desk. Her aspect was casual and comfortable, and she took her usual chair like she'd never left. It felt like the whole catastrophe at the end of her internship hadn't happened.

"So, there's only one strategy that makes sense," Lucy said, starting right in. "We need to file for an annulment, based on the Ta-Zod precedent. A registered pairbond with a higher house can override a marriage with a lower one."

Alura's heart sank. "But that case-- an alpha pulled rank. It hasn't been used as precedent for a long time for a reason. You've said yourself that you hate it. With it, any beta-omega marriage can be taken over by a mating bite bond. It has been used to argue that an alpha who forces their way into a heat avoids prosecution until it's clear whether or not the bite has lasted. You don't want the judge that will take that seriously alone."

Lucy nodded. "It's ugly, but we have the fact that the pairbond predates the marriage. Since all pairbonds are retroactively registered, by registering it, it gives it equivalent status, and the marriage does not have precedence."

"It . . . predates the marriage?" Alura stared at her. She had been there the entire time. She'd noticed they were close from the start, but then it had become fractious and . . . oh.

"Yeah." Lucy's lips twitched to the side. "They've been mated for eight years. But they've been 'being good'."

Alura put her fingers against her temples. If they had just come to her, if they had said they wanted to be together, she would have put her foot down about this marriage. "Being good? Alex is whelping."

"Hey, they were good for eight years. I think we can forgive them one disastrous slip up."

"They didn't _have_ to be good."

"Yeah, but with you as a role model, I think they thought it would be easier than it is."

Lucy met her gaze with a small smile. She didn't duck her head or lower her eyes. Not omega-like, some would say. But it was one of Alura's favorite things about her. The stare went on for a moment too long, and Alura gathered herself back together. "There's one thing I see as an issue," she said.

"I know," Lucy said. "It means we have to register the pairbond, which means Kara will be bound. She couldn't marry for an alliance anymore. It's not the same as if Alex were her _chatis_."

Alura was not concerned about that. "In this case, I think enough sacrifices have been made for the good of the house. It's time for the house to make some sacrifices for the good of the pack. I had a different problem in mind."

"Yes?"

"We need a witness, someone else who knows that they've been pairbonded since before the marriage. I'm afraid I didn't."

Max-Lord wouldn't testify against his own interest. The only other person who might have known . . . was Eliza.

#

Eliza was in the lab with Zor. Zor-Ze noticed Lucy come in right away and smiled warmly at her.

"You've come back," he said. "Did Alura bring you? Does that mean I should avoid dinner again? Last time was explosive."

Lucy snorted, and then grimaced. "Actually, I've come on business. I need to speak with Eliza."

Zor looked at her for a moment, and then nodded. He put his hand on her shoulder, gently clasping it, and guided her toward the other lab. "I hope you can help with this."

Lucy remembered Eliza vaguely from the horrible dinner. There she'd coded like an alpha, stern and scolding. But this close, her scent all over the lab, it was clear that Eliza was not an alpha. She was a beta. Alex's dad had probably been a beta also. Alex presenting as an omega must have been a surprise.

(Mostly, beta families had beta children, just as alpha/omega pairs generally had a mix of alpha and omega children. Crosspairs--alpha/beta, beta/omega--were unpredictable, and someone had theorized that alpha/alpha offspring should always be alpha, but there was only anecdotal evidence for that. And yet, surprises happened everywhere. Some theories said that the reason genera could not be identified reliably before presentation was that they were not distinct genetic features. Beta was default, and alpha or omega statuses were triggered by environmental factors, setting off a wave of hormonal responses that resulted in drastic physiological change. It was possible that simply by growing up with Kara in the In-Ze household, Alex had altered her generic template to end up presenting as an omega. Poor kid.)

"Yes." Eliza frowned at her. "You're Alura's prospective _chatis_ , aren't you? What do you need?"

Lucy shut her eyes. She had come over for dinner a total of _once_. Apparently it had been memorable. "I was her intern. Now I'm an assistant adjudicator. I would like some verification of evidence for a case I'm working in."

"You need something tested? This isn't a forensics lab."

"I need to know how long Kara and Alex have been pairbonded."

Eliza's mouth pinched tight at the corners. "You mean unhealthily obsessed with each other?"

Lucy frowned. "How long?"

"Honestly, forever. Jeremiah and I were excited to move here to work in Zor-Ze's lab, and Kara immediately glommed onto Alex. She was five and Alex was seven, so I assumed that Alura would straighten it out eventually. If anyone has a sense of class differences, it's the In-Ze house, right? I reminded Alex whenever she'd listen that Kara belonged to a different world, that she'd never be a real friend, that at best Alex could be her servant." Eliza wrinkled her nose. "A _chatis_."

This time, even more so, it was clear that to her it was a dirty word.

"When that madman broke in and Jeremiah died, Alex started saying she wanted to be Kara's personal bodyguard. Alura's frustrating sister taught her some things and encouraged her to cut her hair. And then Alex presented as an omega and gave up all of her goals." Eliza shook her head. "I assume that's what you meant, when her obsessive behavior about Kara truly bloomed."

"You don't believe in pairbonds?"

"I think Alphas have a lot of mythology they use to keep the rest of us under their thumbs," Eliza said flatly.

How could she not believe in _pairbonds_? They weren't some magical connection, they were physical, hormonal. Emotions triggered an adrenal response, making the presence of your mate more intense, more affecting, more comforting, than anyone else. Lucy knew what that felt like, and knew how it felt to lose it. Even betas should understand that it was real. Unless . . .

"How disappointed were you, when Alex presented as an omega?" Lucy had heard of this, that some betas found alpha and omega genera to be aberrant and unhealthy. It fed off of fear of alphas and resulted in more prejudice against already vulnerable omegas. She hadn't expected to hear that opinion in the middle of the In-Ze compound.

"How disappointed would you be? To know that your beautiful intelligent daughter would be treated like an object by the rest of the world?"

"Did you stop supporting her because of that? I'm an omega. I know it's hard. If I had an omega daughter I'd make sure that she knew that I'd help her do whatever it was she wanted--"

"And if all she wanted was to be a slave for a brat of an alpha?" Eliza shook her head. "I thought she was finally coming to her senses. Lord-Tech has so many opportunities. Once she got the omega out of her system by getting bred, she could settle back down and do science."

"You pushed her towards Max-Lord?"

"I could never make Alex do anything she didn't want to do. But I knew the Lords would give anything for a taste of the In-Ze name. They would give me access to the research I needed. Alex wanted to make a strong enough statement to get Kara to leave her alone. It worked out." Eliza's lips were tight. "It was going to work out. But no. The In-Ze brat had to stake a claim. She's never been denied anything in her life. Why should she be denied the omega she wants? And that's crafty, craftier than I expected of her, really. You omegas--you can't say no when you're horny, and unless there are locked doors and neon signs, no one ever blames an alpha who walks in on a high heat for taking advantage. Now she's bred her. Alex didn't want this, and the In-Ze brat shouldn't have the right to knock her up and claim her as her own."

She wasn't wrong. But Lucy couldn't help remembering Alex's self-hatred, her thwarted need to protect Kara, even from herself. No one was born hating themselves for being an omega, that was learned. And it was pretty clear where Alex had learned it from. "So you think she should just explain to Max-Lord and keep on with her plan to break the bond with Kara?"

"The moment she missed her first heat, she should have come to me. I can clean her out. I've done it before."

Lucy froze. That shouldn't have shaken her. Getting knotted on the first heat almost always resulted in an unwanted breeding, and at least 50% of omegas got knotted or fucked by a beta on their first heat. Going to the clinic, getting cleaned up and given birth control and suppressants was a rite of passage. But you didn't go to your _mom_. You went to the cheerful omega doctor or nurse who handed you your booklet of instructions and advice and always gave you a hug, reminding you that heat was just part of your life. If it always resulted in pups, the population would be through the roof, so remember to take your pills and when you're really ready, this is what to do. Instead, Alex had gone to her mom to get a dose of shame along with her check up. Lucy felt a growl deep in her own chest. No wonder Alex had gone to Alura when she'd realized she needed out of this mess. And Alura had asked Lucy to take care of it, to take care of her _family_. That meant that for the moment, these kids were her family too.

"I suppose you asked her if she wanted you to do it this time also."

"Of course. She refused. But pregnancy hormones make it hard to think straight. I would have sat her down and done it anyway, but Zor interrupted and she's been hiding ever since."

Lucy couldn't stop the growl this time. Alex had said no and Eliza hadn't respected that. Omegas knew how to say no. The problem was, no one knew how to listen. Whelping hormones weren't even a tenth as bad as heat. And yet Eliza still treated Alex like she couldn't think for herself. "I'm not here for your opinion. I just want facts. If you cleaned her out the first time, she told you then, didn't she, that Kara bit her?"

Eliza curled her lip. "She was still bleeding from it. Savages."

"Where was it?"

"Up behind her ear. Not that that was the only bite mark, just the deepest one."

"Will you sign an affidavit for me that you saw this bite and on what date you saw it."

Eliza took the sheet of paper and briskly wrote a report and signed it. She handed it back with a cold look. "The In-Ze's expect everyone to be at their beck and call. You won't get special treatment for doing this for her."

"I'm not expecting any."

Eliza snorted. "You're an omega. You'd do anything for her knot and her teeth."

No. Lucy sighed as she spent the next eight hours working on nothing but the forms. I'd do anything for _her_.

#

The process involved eighteen forms, a medical exam, and one brief meeting with an adjudicator. The beta frowned at the tangle of forms and dates. He fixed on the medical report verifying Alex's pregnancy and the dates of her heats. He snorted. "The In-Ze clan is laying claim to their progeny, I see."

Lucy gave a casual shrug. She didn't need an obstruction now. "Things happen."

"Alphas of great houses don't have to be responsible with their knots, not if they've got lackies like you to sort it all out."

"All this marrying for alliances is pretty old fashioned too," Lucy commented, staying pleasant, saying something she knew he'd agree with. "I've always thought people should be more like betas. Just see if you like each other first. Then you can almost bet on a pairbond forming. And we would have so much less paperwork."

"Totally," the beta agreed, and stamped the forms.

#

Lucy called up to the compound, the file of papers tucked under her arm, and was announced through the house screens, and led by them into the family den. Alura was waiting, half crushed into the corner of a sofa, long legs brought up to her chest, the scent of tension radiating from her. She looked up. "Is it--"

Lucy held up the file. "Everything in order."

In a whirlwind, Lucy found herself wrapped up in Alura's arms. It was as sudden as when she'd been in heat, but this was just an embrace. Lucy was lifted a little off the ground, and put her arms around Alura's neck, squeezing back. The rumbling in Alura's chest sent comforting vibrations through her, and Lucy shut her eyes, breathing in the warm scent of old books and sweet caramel.

Feet had thundered down stairs from outside, and other vibrations said that people from disparate parts of the house were convergin.

"Da?"

Alura set Lucy back onto the ground. Kara was leaning in the doorway, looking concerned. Zor-Ze appeared behind her, worry on his face. "Kelex said Lucy had news?"

Regaining her balance, Lucy opened her file. "Yes," she said. "Good news."

"Good news?" From the other door, Alex emerged, looking rumpled and sleep-deprived. Her black linen undershirt clung tightly enough to reveal the soft curve of her belly, already starting to show, suggesting that it was going to be more than one pup. Kara's gaze fixed on it and she made a soft helpless noise.

Lucy tried not to roll her eyes. It looked like they'd been 'being good' again. She was glad the papers had come through so quickly. If there was any time the alpha urges to be overprotective and solicitous were appreciated, it was while the omega was whelping.

"Yes. The annulment came through, and the pairbond registry, and I figured we'd do the name changes while we were at it, so there would be no problems with the pups being entered into the house of Ze." Alura had stepped up behind her, looping an arm around Lucy's shoulders, as if she couldn't bear not touching her. Lucy gulped down the upside down feeling in her stomach. "So, um, congratulations. You're legally mates now."

Unexpectedly, Alex looked like she was about to cry. Her scent, pregnancy-strong, filled with relief and guilt.Kara looked like a cat who'd just had a bucket of water dumped over its head. She looked this way and that, and then plunged across the room, tripping over a stray nesting pillow, and righting herself just in time to catch both sides of Alex's head and pull her into her chest.

" _Mine_. You're mine now," she was mumbling, too fast and confused to make all of the words distinct. "I'm going to protect you so hard. I'm going to love you all the time. I'm going to be better, I know I can be so much better for you."

Alex sagged into her, whimpering, letting Kara close her arms around her shoulders and rock her. She caught one of Kara's hands and guided it to her belly. Kara let out a squeak, and then buried her face in Alex's hair, mouthing against her mating bite.

"I don't think they'll surface for a few days," Zor said. He took Lucy's hand between both of his and pressed it. "But I will make certain they thank you when they do. And from me, _thank you_ , Lucy." He kissed the top of Lucy's head and departed.

Lucy, more shocked by that than by anything, looked up at Alura. "Do _you_ want to see the papers?"

"Of course," Alura said.

Kara and Alex had collapsed into a heap of pillows and were whispering back and forth. The whispers were each followed by kisses and bodily explorations that were at the moment innocent, but probably wouldn't stay that way for long. Their scents were already starting to fug with desire.

"Perhaps we should retreat to elsewhere and look over them with tea?"

Alura, unlike everyone else in the house, was interested in the minutiae of the appeals. Lucy was very pleased to be able to relate her interaction with the beta adjudicator and how she'd buttered him along, to Alura's amusement and admiration.

"I don't think I've ever been so angry before, with Eliza and then him." Lucy turned her cup so the tea made small swirls in it. "Being an omega was something I had to overcome, be stronger and better than. I didn't get angry at the way things were stacked against me. What would be the point? But then . . . Alex."

Alura nodded, half looking away. "I failed her. No one of my house should have to live with that kind of shame."

"I'm proud of what I've accomplished," Lucy said, looking down. "And getting angry would be a waste of energy. But I think one of the reasons I never got angry at the world was that I was always a little angry with myself for being an omega. I was made not good enough."

"Lucy--" Alura reached out, her hand closing around Lucy's, her scent warming with anger and protectiveness, as if she could tear out the throat of the way the world made her feel.

Lucy smiled. "I don't feel like that anymore. The world isn't fair, and a lot of things are messy. But there's nothing wrong with me. I don't need to pretend to be a beta to be good enough."

Alura's hand tightened on hers and then released. "So, you're not going to try to work through your heats anymore?" Alura raised an eyebrow, with a very alpha-like smirk.

Lucy wrinkled her nose. "I like work. But, I will schedule it so I can stay home, at least."

"Good," Alura said, her voice half a purr. "Your work ethic is admirable, but I couldn't go into my office for a whole week."

Suddenly, Lucy realized she was going to miss this. She was glad Alex and Kara that they wouldn't be stuck in a legal limbo for any longer. But in these last few weeks, it had felt like she was back in her comfortable internship, working with Alura in a way that wasn't like working with anyone else. It had hardly anything to do with her lingering attraction. She just wanted to see her and talk cases over with her and feel trusted by her. But it was over now.

Alura walked her to the compound gate. "I hear you have your year-end review at the end of the week."

"Yeah." Lucy nodded. Some of her supervisors were still a bit sticky with her because she was an omega, but she thought she'd convinced enough of them that she did good work to keep her on.

"I wish you luck with it."

"Thanks."

Lucy moved toward the gate, and then paused, turning back, trying to figure out how to say what she was feeling.

Alura's hand touched her shoulder. "I can't thank you enough," she said. "For what you did for my family."

Her eyes were silvery with intent, and Lucy, for a moment, forgot how to breathe. "It was--" But before she could form a sentence, Alura's hand curled around her jaw, and she bent to kiss her.

As Alura's mouth pressed against hers, Lucy felt her heart shudder to a stop, the moment turning endless, breathless. Alura broke the kiss, hissed in a breath, and kissed her again, rough this time, with teeth catching her lower lip, biting down and bruising.

Alura pulled away, and Lucy, her heart thundering back into the race, could only gasp.

"I'm sorry," Alura said, still holding her face.The pulse in her fingers was wild and fast, her eyes were black with widened pupils. She licked her lips, once and then again. Then, abruptly, she pushed Lucy out of the gate of the compound. It slid shut with a locking click. Lucy staggered back against the wall.

The entire way home, she couldn't stop grinning.

#

"So," Lucy's head supervisor said. "We would like to offer you a position as full adjudicator. We realize that you are young for the position, but clearly your experience as Justice In-Ze's intern put you a little ahead of the game. And, to be honest, although the general adjudicators are upset that they won't be able to rely on you as much as they have been, they are all excited to be able to dump their problematic cases on their new colleague."

Lucy nodded, trying to swallow down her surprise. This was more than she'd expected. And that was the perfect opportunity to push for a little more. Maybe she wouldn't have a few weeks ago, but that was because she'd believed that because she was an omega, she didn't deserve this. But she worked hard, and they'd just acknowledged that.

"Thank you," Lucy said. "Before I accept, I would just like to disclose that I plan on asking Justice In-Ze to be my heat-partner. I don't want there to be a conflict of interest, or for you to have any reason to suspect favoritism."

"Um," the beta supervisor looked rather bewildered. But one of the alphas cocked his head and gave her a long considering look. " _You're_ going to ask _her_?"

"Yes." Lucy offered a casual shrug. "It could go either way. She's very . . . respectable. I'll be sure to let you know if she says yes."

"Um." The beta looked down at his papers again. "I'll make a note, but I don't see why that should be a problem. Thank you for being upfront about it."

"Not a problem." It was good for them, to have to deal with an omega who wasn't ashamed of being an omega.

#

Alura had had enough of the complaints on her desk about her current case. Everyone was protesting something, or trying to sway her one way or the other. She was considering fining the lot of them for bringing this case in the first place.

She looked up at the knock on her door. Lucy stepped in, leaving the door ajar, as had been their habit. Alura's eyes dropped to her hands, searching for some sort of paperwork. The last time Lucy had come to her office after Alura had insulted her, she'd brought paperwork. Perhaps this time it would be a restraining order.

But even knowing this could be the case, her face flushed and her chest grew tight, pleased that she was near. What did she want? Lucy hadn't made contact since Alura, overwrought and emotional after all of the tension, had kissed her.

"Lucy."

The grin she got in response shifted the tension in Alura from anxious to hopeful. If they could maintain their collegial working relationship--

"Justice In-Ze."

Lucy was still grinning, but no further words followed her formal address. Did that mean this was or wasn't business?

"Is there something I can help you with?"

"I have a request."

"Yes?"

"I was hoping that you would be able to clear your schedule for four days in approximately two weeks. I know that you're busy, but with the lead time, perhaps it would be possible. And if not this time, then a seven-week after that, and . . . also every seven weeks into the forseeable future."

"I--" This was not making sense. Of course she would clear her schedule for Lucy, but--

" _As_ it is two weeks before my heat, I would like to remind you that I am entirely of sound mind, and as I have not pheromone flooded the area, you should be also."

There was some math here. But it wasn't adding up.

Lucy ducked her head, and then lifted it again. An anxious shadow had crossed her face. "I am formally requesting that you join me for my heat, further details to be discussed. I wanted to be sure you know this is what I want, and that you can tell me if you want it also, or don't. Without any sort of confusion."

A warmth that should have been embarrassment but wasn't suffused her. Alura felt herself beginning to smile also. It threatened to become a leer. She restrained herself. "Do you have an authorization I need to sign? If we are going to be completely correct about this?"

Surprise was the first thing to cross Lucy's face, and then her scent warmed with pleased relief. She'd heard the yes behind her words.

"Might be a good idea," Lucy said and tugged a scrap of paper out of her notebook. Across it, she wrote in her messy lawyer scrawl, "Alura In-Ze has accepted/rejected the offer to be the heat-partner of Lucy Sam-Lane, notarized." She slid it across the desk.

Alura circled 'accepted' and signed her name beneath it, and handed it back. Lucy stared at it for a moment, gave a startled laugh, and then signed it also.

"I can give this to my boss. I told them I was going to ask you. I'm sure they're waiting with baited breath to find out if you say yes."

"You told them?"

Lucy nodded, opening her hands and gesturing at herself. "Full adjudicator."

"Come _here_ ," Alura said, a demand, and pulled Lucy into her lap. Her body was warm and lithe against her, her grin vibrant, her scent heady and sharp with happiness. "Congratulations."

Lucy nuzzled into her shoulder, and Alura threaded her fingers into her hair, feeling the warmth of her scalp. She tugged her head back so she could see Lucy's face. "Come to dinner again tonight," she said. "It won't be half as bad as last time. I want, I mean, your offer is so appreciated. I'd love to--" Groping for words didn't seem to be working.

"Knot me?" Lucy asked, murmuring it into her ear so close that Alura could feel the movement of her lips. It was very distracting.

"I-- yes. That. But also, the other ninety percent of the time, I want you."

"That's a lot of fucking." Lucy's voice rumbled in a growl.

Alura lightly smacked her shoulder. "I want your friendship, and your company."

Lucy settled back in her lap and looked at her, her hands coming up to cup her cheeks and rub her thumbs gently across her face. Alura waited with baited breath.

"'I want to be part of your family," Lucy said, and held her head in place to kiss her.

#

 


	3. Chapter 3

POSTEA

 

"Da," Kara sighed as she came into the kitchen the morning after the heat had worn off. "You're the alpha. You're supposed to be the one _giving_ the mating bites."

Alura flushed, reaching up to take down the messy bun that exposed the red mark of Lucy's teeth in the juncture of her neck and shoulder. Lucy stayed her hand, and narrowed her eyes at Kara, who was unexpectedly wearing a scarf in the warm indoors.

"How many bites are _you_ hiding under there?"

Kara flushed red. "She's whelping. Omegas get possessive when they're pregnant."

Lucy snorted. "Hate to break it to you, but omegas are possessive all the time."

Kara packed up all the breakfast she could carry and, grumbling, made her way back to her and Alex's den. Lucy settled into Alura's lap, and Alura wrapped her arms around her shoulders and pressed her nose against the back of her head.

She slid her fingers up Lucy's back until she found the mark right at the nape of her neck, and pressed roughly into it. Lucy whimpered, lost back in the enclosed space that smelled of heat and rut and Alura.

When she'd felt the heat coming, she'd called her sister off-planet, panicking and retreating. She'd asked for so much, for something bigger than anyone deserved. Lois had been unhelpful as always. "First time with a new heat buddy is always awkward, Lucy." And, " _Please_. You're my little omega sister. Do not tell me about all the weird shit you like when you're in heat." But it had helped anyway.

Also, Alura made a worksheet. She handed it over on one of their many meetings for tea in the law guild canteen, very serious. Lucy had looked at the first question and said, "oh no. I'm not taking this home and recording the information for posterity. Let's just talk it through."

" _Here_?"

"Of course not!"

Talking it through meant that when Lucy asked her to not touch her, and to not let anything touch her, Alura knew to hold her down and let her squirm and talk to her, stretching out the distraction as long as possible, while the heat ate its way through her nerves and flesh and sinews. And then finally, when Lucy only had shreds of herself left, Alura pushed hard inside her, teeth in her neck. The release was everything.

Full and achy, she snuggled against Alura, not impatient, not still desperate, even as the knot tied them together.

It got awkward sometimes, feeling seed spilling into you, the hot pulse of a knot caught in intimate areas, when you were sated. Nothing else to do and nothing else to say. But Alura bit lightly at her ears and left red marks on her skin, and Lucy rambled about cases, until, hardly even noticing when they came unjoined, Lucy would snag her file folder and they would talk, curled up naked together, until the next wave of arousal came. Then they would fuck again, Lucy swearing as papers got caught under her, and then swearing more as Alura held her off while she tidied up, before climbing back on top of her and smothering Lucy's complaints with her mouth.

The sting of the bite on her neck felt like a current directed right at her brain and her chest and her center.

" _Mine,_ " Alura murmured into her hair.

Lucy clutched at the arm looped around her waist. Her breath came rough. She tilted her head, pressing her face against Alura's throat.

Alpha and omega were a symmetric relation, she remembered. You push me, and I push you. But this, there was another part to it, something more, something other than scent and biology and need. Whatever it was, though, it was symmetric also.

"Yeah. _Yeah_ _,"_ she said. " _M_ _ine_. You're mine too."

###


End file.
